Shankar–Ehsaan–Loy

Biography

Shankar–Ehsaan–Loy (pronunciation (help·info)) is an Indian musical trio consisting of Shankar Mahadevan, Ehsaan Noorani, and Loy Mendonsa. They have composed music for over 50 soundtracks across five languages: Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Marathi, and English.

Amongst the most critically acclaimed Indian musicians, the trio has won numerous awards, including the National Film Award (India), Filmfare Awards, and IIFA Awards. They are often referred to as the "Amar Akbar Anthony" of the Hindi film music industry.

Shankar Mahadevan

Shankar Mahadevan, the main vocalist of the trio, was born and brought up in Chembur, a suburb of Mumbai, in a Tamil family from Kerala. He learned Hindustani classical music and Carnatic music in his childhood and started playing the veena at the age of five.

He studied under Shrinivas Khale, a popular Marathi music composer. After graduating in 1988 with a degree in Software Engineering from Ramrao Adik Institute of Technology in Navi Mumbai under the auspices of Mumbai University, he worked as a software engineer on Oracle Version Six.

After working for a while for Leading Edge Systems, Shankar ventured into the field of music. He earned his first award as a playback singer in a Tamil movie, collaborating with A. R. Rahman and winning a National Film Award for his song in Kandukondain Kandukondain.

A prominent star in Tamil cinema, he gained further recognition upon the release of his first music album, Breathless, in 1998. In 2019 he was felicitated with the Padma Shri Award for his contribution to Film Music. He has two sons, Siddharth and Shivam Mahadevan, both of whom are singers as well.

Ehsaan Noorani

Ehsaan Noorani is the guitarist of Shankar–Ehsaan–Loy. He studied music with Bismarck Rodrigues from a young age. Prior to going abroad to study further music at GIT (Los Angeles), Ehsaan was an integral part of two local bands in Mumbai, Pegasus, and Crosswinds.

Ehsaan returned to Mumbai and was in demand for his musical skills in composing jingles, working for all the top composers of the time. Until the day Magic Box Productions approached him to compose the jingle for Sona Spices, and that marked the beginning of Ehsaan's independent journey as a composer of jingles in India.

Ehsaan was approached by Mukul S. Anand to compose the music for his film Dus, and he in turn asked Shankar and Loy to join him in composing the music for the film. Dus never made it to the big screen, due to the death of the director.

Ehsaan is the only Indian musician to have endorsed a signature line, 'The Ehsaan Noorani Fender Squier' signature series, for Fender guitars, one of the largest and most reputed guitar manufacturers in the world.

Loy Mendonsa

Loy Mendonsa plays the piano, bass guitar, and harmonica and is currently learning to play the trumpet. Loy was a genius music teacher for a school in New Delhi when he was invited to write the music for the show Quiz Time by Siddharth Basu, who gave him his first break.

Loy then went on to compose the title track for The World This Week and for the Shahrukh Khan TV serial Fauji. Loy moved to Bombay and met Ehsaan in 1989, and together they composed several ad jingles. His daughter Alyssa Mendonsa is a playback singer who has lent her voice to their songs.